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Does 802.11n Spell the 'End of Ethernet'?

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the not-bloody-likely dept.

alphadogg writes "Is the advent of the 802.11n wireless standard the 'end of Ethernet'... at least in terms of client access to the LAN? That's the provocative title, and thesis, of a new report in which the author began looking into the question when he heard a growing number of clients asking whether it was time to discontinue wired LAN deployments for connecting clients. Would 11n, the next generation high-throughput Wi-Fi, make the RJ45 connector in the office wall as obsolete as gaslights?"

6 of 404 comments (clear)

  1. Um, no. by morgan_greywolf · · Score: 5, Funny

    When the Porcine Aviation Assocation makes WiFi as secure as wired LAN, then we'll see the end of Ethernet. Until then, no.

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    1. Re:Um, no. by arivanov · · Score: 3, Funny

      Pigs can fly. It is a matter of applying sufficient thrust.

      It is a matter of contention ratio.

      An average office has a contention ratio of 1:100 for server access and it still works. A WLAN contended to 1:100 will not work. So you have to upgrade your porcine fleet with higher thrust engines. You do that by rolling out a big wireless switch and many small accesspoints under its control each of which has a contention ratio of under 1:10. At that contention ratio deployments for anything more than 10PCs is uneconomical.

      This is all of course if we leave the security aside. But that is another story.

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    2. Re:Um, no. by modecx · · Score: 3, Funny

      Yeah, trouble is, it's a little more obvious when you trip over a foreign CAT 5 cable at 2:00 AM, just to find it leading over to your neighbor's house. It's also a lot easier to wire said cable up to a 110v plug...

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      Constitutional rights may be respected, repealed, or modified; but they must never be ignored.
    3. Re:Um, no. by tooslickvan · · Score: 3, Funny

      This UTOPIA you speak of sounds ideal. Does it come with fluffy white bunnies?

    4. Re:Um, no. by NeilTheStupidHead · · Score: 3, Funny

      Thanks for the tip, but at $475 per five litres, it would be cheaper to build a faraday cage, or buy a new, more powerful router and start an inevitable arms race that will eventually lead to violations of CPC-2-0-03. (Hint, since I build and repair transceivers for a living, I'll probably win ^>^ )

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  2. Re:Yes, of course by winkydink · · Score: 4, Funny

    What do they teach them in schools these days?

    Had a look at Myspace or Facebook? Sigh.

    --

    "I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey